Broken Windows and Depersonalization

PIC broken windows

One aspect of a “broken windows” policy indisputably works, and that is the idea of cutting off crime at the root, before it has a chance to blossom.

But there are different ways to cut crime off. You could go in like a bulldozer, crushing petty criminals like Garner into the ground. Or you could do what a town in North Carolina did: they identify the petty criminals who help sustain the criminal subculture — and they give them a chance to get out, before they “blossom” into dangerous offenders.